Quercus

"An unlikely trio, you might think, but the combination proves quite magical. Together they create a subtle new idiom in which lyrics by Shakespeare, Burns and Housman, a 1940s song by Harry Warren and Mack Gordon, English folk songs and a melody by John Dowland can emerge in a new and delicate light ... This is one of the most surprising and beautiful pieces of work I have heard in a long time".

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"June Tabor has been superb for so long that it is easy to take her for granted as England's finest female traditional folk singer. Despite holding that status for many years, she has never seemed to rest on her laurels ... The combination of Tabor, Warren and Ballamy creates a unique amalgam of folk and jazz elements which is highly successful because it does not attempt to pander to folk and jazz tastes simultaneously. While it blurs the boundary between folk and jazz, sensibly it allows all three musicians to be themselves and, does not attempt to "jazzify" Tabor or "folkify" the others ... A very special album, certain to be one of the year's best".

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"Such is the air of sombre majesty and studied technique filling the speakers it's quite a schock to discover this is a live recording captured from one gig (...) in 2006. Ballamy's economic sax stalks Tabor's voice with dogged devotion - the unconventional combination at times blending into a thrillingly macabre double act - while Warren's cascading piano fills the gaps with evocative dexterity. According to ECM's press release it "blurs the boundaries between folk and jazz" which is only half the story, for the brooding soundscapes their arrangements create and the dark majesty of the music they provide draw on chamber music and classical themes but essentially evolve into a genre of one. Certainly there are folk songs (...) but it's when they stray into more tangled emotional territory that the collaboration really finds its feet. Come Away Death sounds almost satanic as Tabor sings part of Shakespeare's text before Ballamy and Warren take off on their ownengrossinginstrumental journey into the dark side".

"[Tabors] malmfulde stemme formår at finde vej ind til en eviggyldig skønhed, der ophæver skellet mellem fortid og nutid og placerer traditionen i et direkte oplevet nu, hvor dødens skygge ofte lurer som baggrund for udfoldelsen af det levede liv. Dyrkelsen af det intense nu, med udgangspunkt i en assimilation af traditionen, har Tabor til fælles med jazzen og særligt de to musikere - saxofonisten Iain Ballamy og pianisten Huw Warren - hun har fundet sammen med i gruppen Quercus ... De særlige øjeblikke (...) står i kø på et album, der er præget af et dybt musikalsk nærvær mellem de tre medvirkende".